The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) was enacted to provide a qualifying employee with up to 12 weeks of job-protected, unpaid leave during any 12 month period in order to care for the employee’s child, spouse, immediate family member, or self. The FMLA also provides for the employee’s health benefits to be maintained during the leave.

The FMLA mandates that an employer provide a series of notifications to employees regarding employee rights, employer responsibility, and employee eligibility under the regulations. Any employer in the private sector, who engages in commerce or in any industry affecting commerce, and who has 50+ employees each working day during at least 20 calendar weeks of the current or preceding year is required to comply with FMLA regulations. All public agencies (including state and local governments) and education agencies (public or private) must also comply with FMLA regulation regardless of whether they meet the 50+ rule.

To demonstrate FMLA compliance, an employer must post or provide for all employees and applicants (eligible or not) a notice of the basic provisions of the FMLA. Additionally, once an employee becomes eligible for leave under FMLA, the employer must provide the employee with a notice of eligibility, rights and responsibilities, as well as designating any qualifying leave as FMLA while providing notice of that designation to the employee.

Furthermore, if an employer has any FMLA-eligible employees, it must provide a general notice to all employees regarding FMLA rights and any other benefits or leave rights that may be part of company policy. Each employee must certify that they have received this notification, whether it is included within an employee handbook or separately.

How DocRead can help

DocRead is compliance software that works with SharePoint to enable an employer to distribute documentation to a specific employee or group of employees, receive certification that the document has been read, and monitor the progress of the document’s acceptance.

As FMLA regulations require a significant number of time-sensitive notifications, which can add up to a lot of paperwork to track and maintain, DocRead assists by ensuring that your notification documents are distributed to appropriate employees and that they are acknowledged within a designated timeframe.

After you choose the appropriate document to distribute and the group of employees to send it to, DocRead notifies each employee that a reading task has been assigned.

Each employee will be required to read the document and certify that they have received and understood it. They must check the 'I agree' box and then click the 'confirm' button.

The certification message is fully customizable, so you can tailor the message to meet the specific requirements of each document or notification.

Once employees have acknowledged their understanding of the notification, they receive a reading receipt that they may download or print for their records. Reading receipts are also securely stored in a central database, allowing quick access and time-stamped verification of compliance.

DocRead also provides reading reports that can be used to monitor the progress of notification acknowledgement, clearly outlining how many notifications have been assigned, completed or are overdue.